The growing large plants, outdoors, thread...

[Tom Hill]

I was fortunate enough to meet up with Butte recently and he is as solid as folk as it gets, him and his folks, good people, the best. However, imho, if his plants had a brain, they'd be thinking he was a cheap sob until they got ahold of those trenches

Trenches are a somewhat of a waste of soil imo due to the necessary spacing of giant plants. Better to dig 8x8x1'deep holes and fill with the mentioned mix imo. Go lower, go wider, and tend them plenty.

What do you grow? Are you in the 4lb+ beginning of Oct club or are you pushing 10lbs+ in late Oct full season? 10lbs + you should really account for by 14ft on center holes imo. -T

 

[nomaad]

"I guess we should only shoot for just 4-5 lbs per plant and go for quality."

^^^^ And, therein lies the debate

did somebody say "debate?" LOL.

I am shooting for 7 pounders of the highest quality ganja possible. First off, I am mostly growing in 200 gallon containers. In 09, I feel like the quality of my OD 3-5 lbers was very high. So did the marketplace... sort of. While the market is changing rapidly and who the fuck knows what the deal will be come November, the niche I am looking for long term is one of unparalleled quality, whether it be OD, ID or GH... There are other factors too that keep my aspirations in check... for one, I live in a neighborhood. Already a bit of a scene...

That said, I don't have anything against 15 pound monsters. I did order a few 300 gallon smarties... I'm considering running at least a couple of them with Tom's soil mix and feed schedule (if he is so kind to share this with us)... If I had a remote 10-100 acres, I would probably run the whole crop like that.

oh... 4-5 pounders covered 10 foot centers very nicely.

 

[localhero]

Im growing fire og, and a thai crossed with super silver haze along with a hindu kush that resisted all powdery mildew last summer. its not finalized yet. I was reading about how you like to go with crosses for outdoor. unfortunately what I have vegging right now doesnt really fit to that . the thai finishes at 9 to 10 the fire at 10 and the hindu at 9. this is really my first proper attempt at an outdoor grow. last summer was a debacle. was basically me throwing out plants in 5 gallon pots in late july. we just got the place and everything was just go go go and yeah shouldnt even mention it. been rolling indoors since then.

 

[Tom Hill]

Powdery mildew and botrytis etc doesn't scare me, as I learned to deal with them outside via high calcium and pH adjusted foliar sprays. I am also probably growing a few Fire OG, Chem D, 4, Triangle Kush, etc, etc, but I'll be bringing these in during the summer black box when we have an upper hand on the market. You can grow them indeed in the long season, but be aware that two-three weeks extra July veg = double weight. This is where we place our bets -T

 

[localhero]

Right on Tom,

when I saw why you added the extra calcium it all clicked. I finally got rid of it, but i know it will be wanting to come back. The neighbor in the back of my property has chickens and pidgeons and grows vegetables. Corn aphids yay. All the cucumbers and pumpkins i grew started my pm woes last year. Those are gone. Screening my grow with passion fruit vine, nice waxy leaves that never get the pm and its super fast growing.

Gonna be putting the ladies out a week before full moon = april 21st or may 20th here. I know theres a thousand different variables on this question regarding strain and whatnot. But. What size would your 10lb monster be if instead of the 300 gallon you used a 200 gallon or 100 gallon pot? This question will help me decide on size verse numbers for this back yard. 14ft centers in a 45'x23' space would make it hard to do right. I wanna do it right. If thats whats gonna make the most then im down, just too few plants leaves me hanging hard if one goes down.

 

[Cali_Boss]

First off, great thread Tom. ive learned a lot

what kind of cheap, available, ready-to-go soil mixture would you recomend for an auto-flower outdoor grow? im guessing veg cycle nutes would pretty much be unneccesary but are there many good flowering nutes you can mix into the soil form the start? im interested in organic nutes, im not much of a fan of those commercial fertilizers. and my wallet isnt either...

thanks again, great information

 

[bcell]

Any strain advice for us East Coast growers at 40-45 wanting to grow maximum size plants - besides moving to the West Coast? I have moist conditions that will finish Oct 1.

How would Deep Chunk or X-18 fare in these conditions?

 

[theJointedOne]

BTW...I do remember Guano Tea saying he was impressed with Green Crack.

Yeah i remember trying some GC from a guerrilla run. It was really nice!

In my experience, on average, no, no friggen way man. There are just too many factors stacked against us. The old plant can not compete with the young plant, ever. Are we at our best after a long days let alone months of work? Naw, we're spent, we've been exposed to all kind of abuses bugs mold and other from our partners and are ready/begging to retire etc. The healthy long-season plant is the ultimate challenge to the cannafarmer, like catching stealhead with an out of season fly on a cloudy day. -T

sounds like a fellow angler! Yes fishng and growing are similiar


Dam all this talk makes me jealous. I am working in the bay right now and wont be able to get a garden outside this
year

....ahahahahahahahahaha im really frustrated as outdoor growing is my hobby and my passion. If anybody has space for a extra recc let me know.

yeh i pretty much get anxiety everytime i read this thread, i am so mad im not doing anything this season

whhhhhhyyyyyyy!!!

and yet i subcribed to the thread right away! lol

good luck everybody this season!

 

[*Journeyman*]

"Most importantly for all crops in rotation, sulphur is essential for enthusiastic microbial activity. Most microbes need one part of sulphur for each ten parts of nitrogen and phosphorus. What is commonly described as the carbon:nitrogen ratio (C:N) is really the carbon:nitrogenhosphorus:sulphur ratio (C:N:S) and should be approximately 250:10:10:1 for optimal microbial health."

That's some good info there...thanx. Been researching for a project and know that sulphur is important for amino acid synthesis so makes sense microbes would need a decent amount to function properly.

What do you feel is the optimal calcium:magnesium ratio for canna? Seem to remember people saying like 2:1. In the ag research I've been doing seems it's more like 5-7:1 otherwise when the ratio gets below 5:1 you have problems with soil tightening up.

 

[Tom Hill]

7:1 sounds right Journeyman,

Also from Hemp Diseases and Pests and based on Albrecht's model -

"soil saturation optima are 70-80% calcium, 12-15% magnesium, and 3-5% potassium. The optimum 70-80% for calcium means that calcium occupies 70-80% of the total possible cation exchange sites in the soil."

Gotta run but will try to catch-up with other folks questions/input this evening. -T

 

[CityOfTrees530]

First time post, great read and some awesome grows you have.

Really curious on what your making the raised beds out of rather then smart pots and are the bottoms exposed or buried into ground?

What soil would you recommend, I was going to get some truck loads of compost at the dump and black gold potting soil.

09' grow in Butte county: avg weight 1.3lbs

 

[nomaad]

First time post, great read and some awesome grows you have.

Really curious on what your making the raised beds out of rather then smart pots and are the bottoms exposed or buried into ground?

What soil would you recommend, I was going to get some truck loads of compost at the dump and black gold potting soil.

the homemade round planters are always some mix of rebar stakes, field fencing or welded wire and landscaping fabric. IMO smartpots are worth the price (i like open options for moving sites, etc). If you're growing on top of them huge trenches, smartpots don't make the same sense... to me, that is.

i am most likely going with something like the soil mix you mention. Sonoma Compost has a compost called mallard plus with a ton of good stuff in it. They also have a ready to use soil mix that I am considering. I have seen great results in the stuff. I am about to run some soil analises that will help me finalize my decision... I will compare the above options with fresh bag dirt (Roots, but I may just do Black gold too since I have recently come to prefer it) ... my GH thread has details and will have the data posted in it in 1-2 weeks. I am getting antsy... can I wait that long?

 

[*Journeyman*]

If any of you guys are in the Sierra's you might want to check out Full Circle Compost out of Nevada.

EDIT - one thing they've done is about 1,000 soil tests in the Tahoe basin then they balance the compost w/minerals to compensate for the more local imbalances/deficiencies. They were recommended by an ag consultant as having some of the best compost.

 

[localhero]

supposedely this is a great compost http://www.midwestbiosystems.com/acs-value.html

scratch that, they seem to have sold out to a sod farm. Really great old guy on the fone though. Plus they are way out there. Says to stay away from composts with nitrogen content over 1% , means it hasnt been properly broken down yet. Anyways thats for a good hummus compost.

too bad. they gave out some of their compost to the sod farm to test against what they were using and the grass blades grew twice as wide and twice as tall. bought em out after that.

they reffered me to a turkey farm in sonoma who supposedely has something close to what they did.

 

[*Journeyman*]

7:1 sounds right Journeyman,

Also from Hemp Diseases and Pests and based on Albrecht's model -

"soil saturation optima are 70-80% calcium, 12-15% magnesium, and 3-5% potassium. The optimum 70-80% for calcium means that calcium occupies 70-80% of the total possible cation exchange sites in the soil."

I forgot the whole base saturation thing when asking about the Ca:Mg ratio...thx. Info I have in my files, had to go look...lol, is the optimum for base saturation is 68% Ca, 12% Mg, 10% H, 5% K, 3% trace nutrients, 2% Na. Seems when you get below a 60% base saturation rate for Ca then you start to have problems (with Mg going above like 20%).

Anyway...basically what you said. Thought sulphur was in the base saturation equation but it was sodium I was thinking about.

 

[CityOfTrees530]

I'm limited to space so 100 gallon smart pots will have to do, will only have about 6' of growing room for each plant. Thinking 2-3lb plants can be done. Possibilities?

far right row will be mine and the last two on the row next to mine. picked the side ones for more growing groom. 6' from plant to plant.
damn city growing

 

[nomaad]

6' spacing is going to be tight, even in 100 gallon smarties. you're going to wind up with some competition in the foliar zone.... that is, if you were running the strains I will be running this year. You could probably manage to avoid eating up the space by going with some less sativa dominant strains. I grew 2 2-3 lb Bubba Kush plants last year that would have conformed very well to your needs. the 707 Headband also yielded well and did not overgrow the width of its pot too much... a good yielding purple indica might do the trick for you.

not sure about your area, but I was under the impression that you need a 6' fence to legally grow in your yard. Its all about local enforcement policy, I guess. Seems like it would be better security to add a couple of feet to your fence.

 

[theJointedOne]

thats wat i thought nomaad....but ive been up in trinity and some folks there have there gardens in plain sight out...a few even ahd there gardens in their front yards...Albeit they lived in a remote area but it still made me laugh. It is so nice to beable to live somewhere like that!

I think spacing is important for many reasons. it looks like you should be ok like nomaad said if you choose the right genetics. I had a friend who had his first outdoor last year, he spaced the plants so close that in the end there was little air movement and lots of mold/mildew. Plants have periphrial (sp?) sensors just like humans. Most often they will start to grow vertically once they know there is competition for light pushing up against them. Even medium sized containers in the 50-100 gallon range should be planted at least 6 feet apart if not more. Especially if you want to maximize yeild through LST, Topping, Training and any Support/Trellis system you use.

Light is also key. i think most of the bigger growers on icm have Very good light. If you dont have at least 6 hours of direct sun it gets a lot harder to produce plants that yield in the over 4 pound range, imho

 

[nomaad]

In 09 I was invited into a neighbor's backyard garden where she had about 60 plants in 5-10 gallon buckets. Having very little experience at this point, but having had the fundamentals drilled into me by my mentors, I suggested that she get rid of about half of her plants and repot the leftover ones in 20 gallon containers. She's been growing for about 15 years and her yield has been, more or less, the same for the last 5 or 6 years. After culling half her garden (and doing a couple of other thing I advised) this year she more than doubled her yield and lost very little to botrytis and PM problems as in years past.

 

[*Journeyman*]

Plants have periphrial (sp?) sensors just like humans. Most often they will start to grow vertically once they know there is competition for light pushing up against them.

For sure plants can communicate in a variety of ways. This may have more to do with light on the individual plant itself though. One thing I was told is when light passes through the canopy you get more in the infrared spectrum. Plants can sense this and then stretch to compete for light. Like you said air circulation is also an issue. I'm pretty heavy handed when it comes to pruning and training.